


“if we love each (shyly) / other”

by csiwholocked33, talkwordytome



Category: The Fall (TV)
Genre: F/F, Femslash, Fluff, Friends to Lovers, Hurt/Comfort, One Shot, One Shot Collection, Timeline What Timeline
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-06-17
Updated: 2015-07-14
Packaged: 2018-04-04 19:20:54
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 12,845
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4149771
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/csiwholocked33/pseuds/csiwholocked33, https://archiveofourown.org/users/talkwordytome/pseuds/talkwordytome
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"<em>Thank you for being patient, for being here, for liking my daughters, for being kind to them, for existing, for being Stella Gibson. Thank you thank you thank you. I love you.</em>"</p><p>A series of one-shots exploring the beautiful what-if The Fall has given us: what if Reed Smith and Stella Gibson fell in love and lived (their version, anyway) of happily ever after? A handful of moments in which they might've found their ways to each other.</p><p>(The title comes from an e.e. cummings poem: "if i love You". Much like Stella/Reed, it is beautiful. Read it.)</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. "i like kissing this and that of you"

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> *each chapter of this fic can stand alone as a separate one-shot ficlet, but we'd love you forever if you'd read them all, and plus some of the themes and cute fluffy things and character quirks come up in multiple chapters, and plus why wouldn't you want to read all about Stella and Reed being hella cute?  
>   
>  _chapter info:_  
>  **approximate word count:** 2.3k  
>  **rating:** T  
>  **keywords/tags:** hilarity ~ fluff ~ slightly cracky/oc ~ domestic cuteness ~ interrupted sexual encounter

Reed is in the bathroom, brushing her teeth, when she hears the muffled scream.

She nearly chokes on her mouthful of water it catches her so off-guard, and she begins to panic because _Stella_ and her mind immediately launches itself towards the worst possible conclusion and _Stella_ and she needs to get in there but something inside of her is frozen and--

 _Stella_.

She throws her toothbrush down and all but kicks in the bathroom door. “What’s happened?” she demands. “What’s wrong?”

There is no one in the room, save Stella, who is kneeling in the center of the bed. She has a hand pressed over her mouth and her eyes are enormous and the expression is so foreign on Stella’s face that it takes Reed a moment to place it: fear. Reed looks wildly around the room; could someone have broken in, perhaps hidden themselves in the closet? _Spector??_ And then, belatedly, _where are the girls???_

“Stella?” she asks, anxiously, heart in her ears. “Why did you scream? What’s going on? Is someone in here?”

Stella says nothing, just keeps her eyes fixed on a specific minute point on the floor. Reed follows her gaze, but still doesn’t see whatever it is Stella is seeing. It begins to dawn on her that the source of Stella’s distress isn’t another person, at least not one who’s here with them now, though even that doesn’t slow Reed’s racing heart quite back to its normal pace. _Was she having some sort of panic attack? Did she have another nightmare?_

She walks over closer to the bed and bends down to look the still petrified woman in the eye. “Stella?” Reed begins, her voice gentle. “Can you tell me what’s going on? Are you having an… an anxiety attack?”

Stella closes her eyes, draws in a deep breath, presses her fingers to the bridge of her nose. She seems close to tears and Reed wants so badly to hold her, but she also doesn’t want to make things worse, and-- _God_ , this is hard. Reed is debating whether or not to call an ambulance when Stella finally, finally whispers: “it is so fucking ridiculous.”

Reed stares at her, blinks. “What on Earth are you talking about?” she asks, baffled, but even moreso relieved that Stella has at least regained her powers of speech.

“On the floor,” Stella breathes.

“On the floor--what? Stella, _what_ are you talking about?”

Stella swallows. “There is a spider,” she says, barely audible and with as much dignity as she can muster, “there, on the floor.”

A spider. On the floor.

Reed’s first instinct is to laugh--which she absolutely knows is a _terrible_ one, but still--and, miraculously, she manages to suppress it, to keep her tone soothing and even. She affects the same voice that she uses when she’s trying to talk her youngest daughter, Diana, down from a nightmare: reassuring, attentive, warm. “A spider?” she says. “Where on the floor? Can you show me?”

Stella points a single, trembling finger to the spot at which she’d been staring. “There,” she says, and there’s a threat of a whimper in her voice.

Reed follows the line Stella's finger draws in the air, and indeed there is a spider: it is tiny, one might even say miniscule, and doesn’t seem to be interested in anything beyond its own spidery existence. Reed is wondering if it might already be dead, when suddenly it begins to crawl and Stella screams so loudly that Reed jumps a bit and very nearly presses her hands to her ears.

“I’m sorry,” Stella gasps. “I’m so sorry.”

“There’s nothing to be sorry for,” Reed soothes. She looks back at Stella, offers her a smile. “Here,” she says, “is what I’m going to do. I’m going to get a paper cup from the bathroom, get the spider inside it, and put it back outside where it belongs. Alright?”

For a moment, she worries that she’s come off as patronizing, that she’s being silly, but Stella doesn’t scoff or roll her eyes; she just nods, as though in that moment the entire world depended on Reed’s being able to get the spider out of the bedroom.

Reed’s plan goes off without a hitch, and by the time she’s returned from her trek to release the spider back into the wild (secretly she has decided that it’s a girl and to call her Andrea), Stella has moved from her stock-still kneeling position. She’s on the edge of the bed now, her face buried in her hands. “Oh, Stella,” Reed says softly. She sits down next to her and begins rubbing her back in methodical circles.

They exist in this silence for a few long minutes. Stella breaks it: “I cannot believe,” she mutters into her hands, “that just happened.”

She gazes meekly up at Reed. Her face is slightly tear-streaked and scarlet. “They’ve always terrified me--” she starts.

“Spiders?”

“Mhmm.” Stella nods, looks for a moment as if she's about to speak again, and then instead resumes the embarrassed head-in-hands posture.

“Well,” Reed says delicately, “I suppose everyone has at least one fear like that.”

“It’s completely irrational,” Stella says, more to herself than to Reed. “It was _minute_. The size of a... a fingernail. Smaller, even.”

“It was a bit... little,” Reed agrees tentatively.

“Go ahead and laugh at me..." Stella sighs, “I don’t blame you.” Her voice is returning to its usual register, thank God, and Reed smiles a little.

“No, no,” Reed says hastily, though she _is_ finding it increasingly difficult not to laugh now that the real fear has passed and she’s been given permission. “It’s not that it’s funny, that you were scared; I mean, it’s... just that, well, you’re so brave and level-headed and _cool_ ordinarily and that--it was a _spider_ , Stella." She lets out a chuckle. "You deal with murderers and psychopaths every day and..." --she's full-on giggling now--"I just never imagined that you of all people would be so frightened by a spider. That’s all.”

Stella isn’t laughing along yet, but there’s something like a smile in her eyes. “It’s not exactly something one would brag about,” she says, and Ice Queen Detective SIO Stella Gibson is _blushing_ , and Stern-Faced Pathologist Dr. Reed Smith is doing her best not to visibly swoon.

Perhaps it’s because she’s tired and punch-drunk already, but Reed is starting to laugh so hard that she can barely breathe. “I thought you’d been _murdered_ ,” she gasps, “or that a someone had broken in, or something horrific like that. I thought I might have to improvise and use the toilet brush as a weapon.”

Stella is laughing now, too--no, not laughing, she is _giggling_ , Stella Gibson is _giggling_ , and it might just be the best sound Reed Smith has ever heard in her life. “What on Earth,” she says, “would you have done with your toilet brush?”

“Defended your honor,” Reed suggests, and Stella throws back her head and cackles. "I'd thought perhaps I could whack him in the head and then maybe between the legs, with the hard end, the handle, see, I'd even devised something of a plan..." And now Reed is the one being made fun of, and Stella is doubled over breathless with laughter. Crawling up onto the bed and placing a hand on Stella's knee, Reed tries to shush her, albeit with little to no success. “Hush, we’ll wake the girls!” she says weakly, still giggling herself.

Stella still doesn't stop laughing, and without thinking Reed leans forward and presses her hand to the other woman’s mouth. They both fall silent. Seconds pass. Reed doesn't move her hand. Then Stella opens her lips a bit as if to say something, Reed’s middle finger slips slightly into her mouth, and the spell is broken. Reed whips her hand back into her lap and looks down at the bedspread like suddenly it’s fascinating. She begins to say something stupid and overly impersonal, but she doesn’t get so much as three words out, because then Stella’s lips are on her cheek and she can’t speak, can’t move, can’t breathe. When Stella draws back, their eyes meet like in the movies and a thousand questions pass unspoken. Evidently their consensus must've been a “yes,” because the next thing Reed knows she is pinned to her headboard and Stella Gibson is sucking on her lower lip.

Oh. _Oh_.

After a moment it occurs to Reed that perhaps she should do something, say something, ask if this is really a good idea. After a few more moments it occurs to her that she could just as easily say _fuck it_ and continue to make out with Stella Gibson. As a wave of chlorine-scented blonde hair curtains her face and a hot, sweet breath fills her right ear, Reed’s decision is effectively made for her. “Well,” she says, her voice husky and low. “Hello.”

Pulling back to look at her again, Stella smiles, eyes bright.

She is the one who’s on top, but then she shifts so that she’s lying back on the bed and staring up at Reed: a wordless invitation. Reed blinks her dark eyes. Then, she grins. _Okay_ , she thinks. _This is actually happening._

Reed immediately sets to undoing the first few buttons of Stella’s flannel pajama top, and then she goes about the delicious business of pressing careful, strategic kisses to the marble column of her neck, to her delicate clavicle, to the tops of her soft breasts. Stella shuts her eyes, her breath quickening,their hearts beating in time. Reed pauses and then nips Stella’s neck, and the slight moan that she elicits then is really almost too much.

“I thought,” Stella murmurs, “you’d only ever been with one woman before me.”

Reed pauses her ministrations to whisper into the other woman's shoulder. “I have only ever been with one woman before you.” She flicks her eyes up to meet Stella's for a moment, and then promptly resumes kissing every inch of newly bared porcelain skin.

“Then darling,” Stella sighs, “you are just preternaturally gifted at this.”

Reed is untying the drawstring of Stella’s pajama bottoms (she’s getting close to ripping it, she’s so desperate for the next part, for more, for _Stella_ ), when she hears scuffling sounds near the bedroom door. She goes stone-still.

“Fuck," she says quietly.

More than a little frustrated, Reed sits up and rakes her dark hair out of her eyes. She untangles herself from Stella, which proves quite difficult because Stella has practically wrapped herself around Reed. She walks over to the door and opens it, and in tumble Soni and Diana, who clearly had their spying little ears pressed to the wood.

Reed looks down at them, eyebrows raised. “Can I help you?”

They seem only very slightly shamefaced at having been caught. “We heard screaming,” Soni says slowly, “and then it got quiet. We were scared.”

Reed glances back at Stella and rolls her eyes; Stella languidly flops back onto the pillows. Reed kneels down so she’s eye to eye with her daughters. “I’m sorry if we frightened you,” she says sincerely.

“What was going on?” Diana asks from around her thumb in her mouth.

Reed gently pulls Diana’s hand down. She looks over at Stella, who has at least had the good sense to re-button her shirt but is quite determinedly looking anywhere but Diana and Soni. Finally, Reed says “Stella was a bit frightened of something, too. That’s all.”

The girls seem flatly amazed that Stella Gibson could be frightened of _anything_. Soni cocks her head to the side. “What of?” she asks Stella.

Stella goes up on her elbows and purses her lips. She waits a long time to answer, as though she’s weighing her options against possible outcomes. “Spiders,” she says eventually. “Well, one spider in particular.” She pauses again. “I’m not...overly fond of them.” She looks down at her chest, not meeting their eyes; she's never sure how to talk to children.

Soni looks at her mother, then back at Stella. She goes nearer towards the bed. “I don’t like sloths,” she stage-whispers to Stella. “They’re too slow.”

Soni’s face is so earnest and serious that Reed wants to cry and laugh and hug her all at once. Stella smiles, and it’s small but it's genuine. “Fortunately for you, I don’t think sloths are especially high on the list of animals that are likely to appear in your house,” she tells Soni in her own adorable stage-whisper.

“I don’t mind spiders, though,” Soni says. “I could get rid of them for you.”

Stella reaches out an uncertain hand and for a wonder Reed thinks she’s going to push Soni’s hair behind her ear, but then the hand falls down to Stella’s side. “Thank-you,” she says. She's trying so hard, and Reed adores her for it.

“Mummy,” Diana says softly to Reed, “can we sleep in here tonight? Please?”

Reed offers Stella an uncertain glance. “Well,” she begins, “I don’t know if--”

“It’s fine with me,” Stella interrupts. “Assuming that it’s also fine with you.”

Stella has given Reed a gift so all-encompassing that she doesn’t even know how to go about thanking her, her heart is so full: _thank you for being patient, for being here, for liking my daughters, for being kind to them, for existing, for being Stella Gibson. Thank you thank you thank you. I love you._

Instead, she just nods and hopes that it’s enough.

“Yay!” Diana and Soni shout, and dive into the bed. Reed slides in under the covers on her side, and the girls are getting big and it’s crowded and a bit too warm, but Reed doesn’t mind and Stella doesn’t seem to either. Reed flicks off the lights, and the girls are still and sleeping within minutes. In the dark, Reed seeks out Stella’s hand; they lace fingers. Stella brings Reed’s knuckles to her mouth and kisses them, once, tenderly.

Half-asleep herself, Reed mumbles, “If every time there’s a spider there’s a good chance of sex, I might start letting them into the house myself.”

“Don’t you dare.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The chapter title also comes from a cummings poem: "i like my body when it is with your". We're going for a cummings theme here, y'all, because poetry. And erotic poetry at that. Mmm.
> 
> Alan Cubitt has noted in interviews that the reason Reed didn't sleep with Stella in the show is because she's still married, but for the sake of these one-shots, csiwholocked33 and I are operating under the assumption that Reed is divorced. Divorce isn't really a pleasant thing, of course, but it does make our jobs as writers a bit easier.


	2. "since feeling is first"

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _"It’s going for midnight and it’s raining, and Reed Smith is sitting in her living room, nursing a cup of tea and worrying. About Stella Gibson."_
> 
>  
> 
>  
> 
>  
> 
> A one-shot that, if we're being honest, is pure fluff served with a side of gooey feels, but there really is something unbelievably satisfying about that, no? Between the case and Spector and feeling under the weather, it's all getting to be too much for Stella, but--luckily--she has Reed to make it better.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> *each chapter of this fic can stand alone as a separate one-shot ficlet, but we'd love you forever if you'd read them all, and plus some of the themes and cute fluffy things and character quirks come up in multiple chapters, and plus why wouldn't you want to read all about Stella and Reed being hella cute?  
>   
>  _chapter info:_  
>  **approximate word count:** 2.8k  
>  **rating:** barely T  
>  **keywords/tags:** sickness/care ~ hurt/comfort ~ friends to lovers ~ references to sexual assault

It’s going for midnight and it’s raining, and Reed Smith is sitting in her living room, nursing a cup of tea and worrying. About Stella Gibson.

She doesn’t really want to be worrying about Stella Gibson, nor does Stella Gibson need to be worried about. But still. Reed’s mind keeps replaying over and over the scene from just a few nights ago: the long kiss at Bert’s Bar, Stella leaning in close to her, then closer, their private laughter, the two of them standing near the elevator, her saying _no, I can’t, I’m sorry, I can’t._

Reed is replaying that last part with increasing frequency.

 _I can’t… I was brought up in Croydon._ Brilliant, Reed, just brilliant. Turn her down and then give such a bullshit excuse that she’s left alone _and_ confused.

Stella hadn’t seemed sad or even all that surprised, but Reed still feels--not quite guilty, that’s not the right word, and neither is remorseful; she feels, she feels….

Worried.

It also doesn’t help that that...that _thing_ broke into Stella’s hotel room that exact same night; Reed can’t stop replaying that scene either. Fucking Spector. Fucking everything. She’s terrified for Rose because nobody even knows if she’s alive and she’s terrified for her daughters because how the _fuck_ is she supposed to raise them in a world where people--no, not people, _men_ \--like Spector exist and all she really wants to do is talk to someone but the one person she knows could make things feel alright is the one person she probably _shouldn’t_ talk to and--

_Fuck._

Reed has Stella’s number and she’s seriously debating whether or not to call her (though she honestly has no idea what she’d even say: _I’m sorry? This case is hideous and I’m concerned for you? I liked kissing you, and I wouldn’t mind doing it again? And again, and again, and again?)_ , when there’s a knock on her front door. She starts. She’s not expecting anyone and while she knows it’s likely not anyone dangerous, if the last few weeks have taught her anything, it’s to always keep her guard up.

When Reed looks through the peephole, she’s imagining it’ll be some sort of dark, lost stranger, someone she’d feel nervous about running into, even in the daylight. Once Reed’s seen who’s actually standing there, though, it takes her a moment to comprehend it--she can’t believe she’s managed to conjure her out of thin air--it’s Stella.

She unfastens the lock and chain and without a word Stella steps into the foyer. She’s rain-speckled and tousled-haired. The circles under her eyes are so dark they resemble bruises more than anything else, as though the metaphorical monster that is this case had morphed into a literal one, as though it were breaking into Stella’s room every night and battering her. (Reed swallows hard at that; the image hits much too close to home). Reed is quite sure that she’s never seen a more miserable looking person in her life, and that’s saying something seeing as she works with the dead.

Reed is also sure that all she wants to do is hug every last ounce of unhappiness out of Stella, but she holds herself back. There are a million different things she could say, should say, but all she manages is a thin “hi.”

Stella smiles, just a little. “Hello.”

They lapse into an awkward silence. Stella Gibson is standing in Reed Smith’s foyer. Reed is reminded of how strange it always felt to see teachers outside of school, when she was younger; how even though she knew they had lives beyond their classrooms, she still felt that she was witnessing something private, intimate. “Not to sound rude,” she begins tentatively, “but what--”

“Am I doing here?”

“Well,” Reed says. “Yes.”

Stella sighs, and it’s such a weary sound that Reed regrets asking the question at all. But then Stella answers: “I looked up your address.” She pauses, and Reed suddenly understands that Stella must be as nervous about this as she is, and it’s oddly comforting. “I haven’t been sleeping well,” she picks back up, “at the Merchant. Not since--well. You know...” she trails off, looking intently down at her hands.

Reed frowns. “No, I can’t imagine anyone would sleep well after that,” she says sympathetically, and then smiles. “Not even the fearless Stella Gibson.”

Stella laughs dryly. “Not fearless,” she says. “Merely a singularly gifted actress.”

There is a certain element of vulnerability to Stella’s self-deprecating response, and it doesn’t help a bit that she looks so very pale, so drawn. Her green eyes are terribly exhausted. Suddenly it’s all too much for Reed to take, and maybe it’s a night for saying _sod it, why not_ because she finds herself taking steps closer to Stella and doing what she was too scared to do mere minutes ago, what she was too scared to do as they stood near the elevator, what she’s been too scared to do from the moment she met Stella weeks and weeks ago. She doesn’t have the energy to pretend anymore; unlike Stella, she’s never been much of an actress.

Stella practically melts into Reed’s arms, as though she’d spent her entire day waiting for them. She presses her face to a warm spot on Reed’s neck, almost exactly between jaw and shoulder. She exhales, her breath a soft sigh. Reed is a little smitten.

There’s a rumble of thunder in the distance, and Reed murmurs into Stella’s hair, “When it rains...”

Stella smiles, and it is a stamp on Reed’s skin. “It does so often seem that way, doesn’t it?” she says into her collarbone.

Reed thinks that she might just be content to linger in their embrace forever (or at least the foreseeable future) and is tentatively planning to do just that when Stella abruptly breaks it. Reed is surprised and more than a bit hurt, and she’s about to ask what she’s done wrong, but then Stella jerks forward with three small, tight movements.

Reed’s eyebrows quirk upwards. “Bless you…?” she asks.

Stella sniffles. “Thank-you,” she says, her voice a bit rougher than normal.

Reed ghosts a hand over Stella’s arm. “You’re shivering,” she says.

Stella sniffles again. “Yes,” she agrees absently. Then she pulls Reed into another hug, instinctively seeking out that same spot on Reed’s neck, and she understands that it must be a place that Stella loves, that there’s a spot on her body that Stella Gibson _favors_ , and she very nearly dissolves into a puddle on the floor then and there.

“Come on,” Reed whispers. “Why don’t you go up to my bedroom and dry off. When you get to the top of the stairs, it’s the first door on the left. There are towels in the closet just inside the ensuite, and-- _Tanya Reed Smith, this is no time to be picturing the poor woman naked in your loo_ \--you can borrow my night things; there are pajamas in the bottom drawer of my dresser. I’ll be up in a bit.”

Stella grumbles slightly, either at being so explicitly taken care of or, Reed desperately hopes, perhaps at the prospect of leaving Reed’s embrace. Reed can’t help but smile at the thought. But then Stella pulls weakly out of her arms and proceeds to ascend the stairs without so much as another word, and that’s more than enough to set off additional alarm bells in Reed’s head. Stella is calm, Stella is collected, Stella is self-possessed, but Stella is never so… subdued.

Once Stella has disappeared from her sight, Reed sighs. Then she ducks into the kitchen. She has an idea.

Reed wanders into the bedroom a few minutes later and finds Stella lying on her bed, atop the covers, dressed in Reed’s yellow flowered pajamas. She’s curled up and her eyes are closed, but Reed knows that she isn’t sleeping. Stella Gibson would never let her guard down so easily. She looks painfully young, and somehow smaller than usual. Reed sits down gently next to her, a steaming mug in each hand. “I brought you something,” she says softly.

Stella’s eyes blink slowly open, and with a considerable amount of effort, she sits up. Reed offers her the mug with the Monet painting screened onto the side. Stella inclines her head in thanks and then, examining the mug, says, “ _Agapanthus_.” The four careful syllables are shaky, sleepy, scratchy, but nonetheless Reed finds them alarmingly alluring, and perhaps even more alarmingly, wildly adorable.

She tries for a casual smile. “Yes,” she says. _No, I am most certainly not falling for you like an overcooked souffle._

“I’ve always liked that series,” Stella says, and Reed is startled out of her metaphor and back into the conversation. She takes a tentative sip. As soon as the contents of the steaming mug hit her tongue, her face registers surprise. “I was expecting tea,” she says once she’s swallowed.

“It’s a hot toddy.”

“I realize that,” Stella says. “It is excellent whiskey.” She looks at Reed slyly, green eyes sparking. “Dr. Smith, are you trying to seduce me?”

Aware though Reed is that she must be turning a dozen shades of red, her answer--to her credit and Stella’s great chagrin--comes out relatively poised: “I can’t help it,” she purrs. “In those pajamas? You’re absolutely irresistible. I want to take you to bed and ravish you.”

Stella snorts, unruffled as ever. “Very Victorian.”

She takes another sip of the toddy, and the room goes still for a moment. “I’m not ill,” Stella says quietly.

“I never said you were.”

Stella’s gaze is level. “Hot toddies,” she says between sips, “are a common folk remedy for upper respiratory illnesses.”

“You were chilled,” Reed shrugs. “And you didn’t seem much like a hot cocoa girl to me.”

Stella opens her mouth, perhaps to reply, but instead brings her elbow up to her face and smothers a series of violent coughs in the crook of her arm. When the coughing subsides she unconsciously rubs her chest, as though it aches. Reed frowns sympathetically. She moves so she’s more fully on the bed, closer to Stella, but still not quite touching her. “You know,” she says, “it would be alright. If you were ill, I mean.”

“I’m not,” she insists with a punctual sniffle.

“Okay, so you’re not. But it would be alright if you were.”

Stella sneezes--three in a row again--in response, which is as good an answer as any. For some reason, Reed finds herself making a mental note: _Stella Gibson, sneezes in threes_. She doesn’t really know why that fascinates her, except that any and all things Stella Gibson related are completely and utterly intriguing and precious to her, that she could spend the rest of her life cataloguing all she knows about Stella and it still might not be enough.

Reed cups Stella’s chin in her hand and guides her face upwards. She places her other hand on Stella’s forehead. “You’re feverish,” she says.

“Am I?” Stella breathes. “How odd.” She shuts her eyes. “You know,” she continues, “when I was a girl and I felt ill, my mother checked for a temperature by kissing my forehead.”

The corners of Reed’s mouth turn up in a smile. “Oh, did she now?” she asks. Stella nods earnestly.

Before Reed really knows what she she’s doing, she is bestowing a soft kiss on Stella’s forehead, which really is quite warm. Stella leans into the touch without realizing. “What’s the verdict, Dr. Smith?” she whispers.

“I’d say about 100.8, 100.9,” Reed whispers back, her mouth still very near to Stella’s temple. Stella shivers her agreement.

Reed pushes several strands of silken blonde hair back from Stella’s face. Then she stands and gently guides Stella underneath the cotton sheet, the light fleece blanket, and the blue and red plaid quilt. She pulls it up to near Stella’s chin and flicks off the lights. “Sleep,” she instructs.

And, remarkably, Stella does.

 

* * *

Well, at least she does for a few hours. But her sleep is restless and fractured; she’s had awful, vivid nightmares ever since she was a little girl, and they seem to worsen when she’s especially exhausted or ill. Or in this case, both. She tosses and turns in Reed’s bed as her unconscious mind unceasingly slips from one nightmare into the next.

_Hands around her neck. Tight, then tighter still. Someone on top of her, their hot, panting, sour breath mingling with her own. They are pulling at her clothes, tearing them. Something is stuffed in her mouth—a pair of underwear. Hers. Wrists are bound. Can’t move, can’t scream, can’t hardly breathe—_

“Stella? Stella!”

Stella sits abruptly upright, but her eyes remain faraway and wild. Her heart is racing. She can’t catch her breath; she tries to count to ten, because that’s what she does, that’s what always works. But her chest is tight and she’s wheezing and she can’t free herself from the fog of the dream and she gets stuck on _three, three, three._

Someone’s hands are on her shoulders now. A fresh surge of panic surges through her— _was it not a dream? Has he found her, here?_ —and she goes to yank herself away but then the same voice that woke her says, “Stella, it’s Reed. It’s Reed. I’m here. I’m here, and you’re safe.”

“Reed…?” is all Stella can manage, her voice raspy with sleep and bad dreams and-- _fine_ \--the scratch and grit of some sort of upper respiratory illness. Reed has not let go of her shoulders; she is an anchor, mooring Stella in the here-world where she belongs, protecting her from all of the phantoms that might try and pull her back.

Reed spends the next few minutes talking to Stella, and though Stella doesn’t consciously register much of what she says, she’s unspeakably grateful for the cool lilt of Reed’s voice, the warm hands clasping her own, the sheer nearness of her. As long as she is with Reed, she is safe, even as cruel, whispery voices from deep inside of her mind wail and warn her she’s not. In this moment, at least, here with Reed, she is safe. And for Stella, that counts for something. It counts for a lot.

Stella can feel herself beginning to return back from whatever dark place she’d been stolen away to. She has to start the counting over a few more times, but eventually she arrives at ten. Her heart is still beating faster than she’d like, but at least it’s not going at a hummingbird’s rate anymore. Her breaths are shaky, but the wheeze gradually diminishes. She dimly realizes that she is drenched in sweat and shivering much harder than she had been earlier, almost uncontrollably, in fact; her teeth are chattering. Reed’s hands are tugging gently at her hands, and it takes Stella a moment to figure out why: she’d had them clenched into fists so tight that there are dark grooves left on her palms from the dig of her fingernails.

“Sweetheart,” Reed says, and her voice is so warm and kind that some internal spring releases in Stella, and she begins to weep—not soft tears, but great, shaking sobs that come crashing up upon each other like waves. She would normally be embarrassed, but in this moment it is such a heady relief to let go of it all, if only briefly.

Reed puts a sturdy, comforting arm around her shoulder and pulls her near. “Hey, hey,” she says, “you’re okay. It’s okay.”

“I can’t--I don’t...I don’t know--I...I...I,” Stella chokes out, but Reed shushes her.

“And, you’re not a bit well,” Reed says matter-of-factly, and it’s such an understatement that Stella bubbles out a hysterical laugh that almost immediately becomes another sob.

Stella’s crying eventually slows and then stops, though it leaves her sniffling even worse than before. Reed seems to sense that Stella needs to sneeze before Stella herself even knows it, because suddenly Reed is placing a bouquet of tissues in Stella’s hands. Stella brings them up to her face and catches a trio of heavy sneezes. She’s too tired to be demure, so she blows her nose, hard, and then emits a painfully pathetic-sounding whimper. It makes Reed’s heart hurt to watch.

Stella lowers the tissues and stares at Reed blearily. Reed pulls her in closer, so that her head is nestled between jaw and shoulder. Reed must’ve realized that it’s her favorite place, and that’s a thought comforting enough to nearly to start Stella crying all over again. “That must’ve been some nightmare,” Reed says.

“Mmm,” Stella says. “I have them often. But one never does quite get used to it.”

“No,” Reed says. “I don’t suppose one would.”

Stella coughs into her shoulder, and there’s a dull ache in her chest as she does it. “I feel dreadful,” she finally admits.

Reed smiles. “You certainly had me fooled,” she says, and kisses her forehead again.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The chapter title is also the title of a cummings poem--"since feeling is first."
> 
> csiwholocked33 & I figured that these one-shots can exist on a floating timeline of sorts? We weren't planning on ordering them in a specific way, that is; we'll write about what the mood strikes us to write about. For example, the first one-shot would technically come after this one in time, just based on how Stella and Reed are interacting/what's going on in their lives in both. If that makes sense. If it gets unclear, we can always establish where we are in the notes!


	3. "and kisses are a better fate / than wisdom"

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _Stella stands, takes a few steps closer to Reed, her heart speeding its fevered pace. “How am I holding up?” she repeats, her voice a near-whisper. She is right in front of Reed now; their noses are practically touching. “I’m here.”_
> 
>  
> 
> In which Jim Burns was a complete and utter fuck, and Reed Smith is there to pick up the pieces.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A bit of canon divergence in here, the extent of Stella's injuries from s2 ep3 and the way that they occurred being the most major. It makes Burns look worse than he does within the context of the show (but, also, neither of us care for Burns all that much in that episode. Sorry not sorry). That being said, this part of the fic does contain descriptions of injuries sustained in a moment of abuse/attack and a brief reference to the attack itself, so please skip this chapter if you think that might be triggering or upsetting to you. Additionally, we tacked something fun onto Stella's self-defense (trust us, you'll know it when you get there).
> 
> In terms of timeline, this one-shot would occur likely around the same time the second one did.
> 
> *each chapter of this fic can stand alone as a separate one-shot ficlet, but we'd love you forever if you'd read them all, and plus some of the themes and cute fluffy things and character quirks come up in multiple chapters, and plus why wouldn't you want to read all about Stella and Reed being hella cute?  
>   
>  _chapter info:_  
>  **approximate word count:** 2.5k  
>  **rating:** barely M  
>  **keywords/tags:** explicit description of attempted sexual assault ~ hurt/comfort ~ interrupted sexual encounter

Stella is lying on the cot in her office, staring up at the ceiling and contemplating just how hard it is becoming to exist as a physical entity.

Really, all she wants is to just _stop_ existing for a while, though of course she would never say that to anyone; they would misunderstand, would think, in various degrees of panic, _Stella Gibson wants to die_. And she doesn’t want that, not at all. She wants to go to the Nowhere Place for a while. She smiles to herself at the old name. When she was a girl, long before she’d trained herself to journal her dreaming, before she’d understood that many of her dreams were lucid ones, Nowhere Place was a term she’d coined when she needed to describe what so often happened when she slept--how she slips into that strange liminal space of not-quite-asleep-but-not-quite-awake. Her body becomes heavy and still, but her thoughts are still moving, still completely under her control.

She is longing for that world: one where she can be floating and free while staying utterly in command of all that happens. A world that, incidentally, is the exact opposite of the one in which she finds herself now.

Stella realizes she doesn’t know how long it's been since she lay down (she’s been losing chunks of time quite often over the last few days, which ordinarily would be of more concern to her, but she lately knows that it’s only because she is so _fucking exhausted_ ), and she sits up to check the time. She winces. She’s still sore from a few nights ago, from the… misunderstanding. She laughs darkly, and that hurts too. _Misunderstanding_ , she thinks, mentally making the enormous quotation marks around the word rather than moving her achy arms any more than necessary.

She’s still immersed in her thoughts when there’s a knock on the doorframe, and she jumps a bit. 

“Sorry...” Reed says from the doorway. “I didn’t mean to startle you.”

Her thick, dark hair is pulled back in its usual ponytail and her eyes are full of something… concern, perhaps? _Yes_ , Stella decides, though she wonders: who for? Rose, of course, as is to be expected. Stella’s been worrying over her too. But Reed looks to be worrying also, more immediately, for... her. _Me; she’s worrying over me._ Stella’s heart skips a beat at the thought. She doesn’t know how her mind arrived at this odd conclusion, but she does know that it’s true. Reed, with her gorgeously expressive face that betrays all she is feeling, is not a terribly difficult person to read. Plus, Stella’s always been a rather prolific people-reader.

“Stella?”

Stella shakes her head as though to clear it. “Sorry,” she says.

Reed is smiling a little, bemused; one immaculate eyebrow is raised slightly, an adorable smirk gracing her features. Stella is suddenly very aroused. Fortunately for her--unlike poor Reed, with her precious poker-face deficit--Stella Gibson is well-trained in masking whatever it is she’s feeling. She crosses her legs and no one’s the wiser. She could just as easily be dreadfully bored (and not terribly turned on).

“Where did you disappear to?” Reed asks, wholly innocent of the great lewd carnival that’s suddenly and quite relentlessly begun parading around Stella’s mind.

Stella massages her temples, trying to ward off what is promising to be a spectacularly bad migraine. “Somewhere...” she says simply, slowly, “better than here.”

“Must’ve been nice.”

“Oh, yes,” Stella sighs. “Though the problem with disappearing to anywhere so lovely is that it gets increasingly difficult to make an argument for returning, particularly when this,” she gestures to her office, to the station in general, to the entire fucking case, “is what’s waiting for you once you’re back.”

Stella takes a sip of the coffee that’s sitting on her desk and her lips pucker in distaste. It’s cold and bitter, but at least it’s caffeine. She glances back up at Reed. “What are you doing here?” she asks, not unkindly. 

She’s expecting Reed to make an excuse-- _forensic reports, new evidence, wanted to run something by you, additional details on Rose_ \--but then Reed Smith manages a near-impossible feat: she surprises Stella Gibson. “I just wanted to check on you,” she says. “See how you’ve been holding up, you know, after what happened a few nights ago. That’s all.”

“Thank-you,” Stella says quietly, sincerely. “That means a lot.” And it does, more than Reed could--ever would--understand.

“And how are you holding up?” Reed asks, stepping more fully into the room.

_How am I holding up? A murderer broke into my room mere nights ago and read a collection of my most intimate thoughts. A man I thought I could trust assaulted me, violated me, hurt me. I haven’t slept for more than forty-five minutes straight in… well, going on three days now. Your best friend is missing, possibly dead, and I’m sure that it’s entirely my fault. I’ve been snapping hair-bands against my wrist again; I thought that part of my life was long over. I think I might be forgetting how to breathe. You are the only person I’ve felt comfortable with since I first left London. Longer, even. I want you. I need you._

Stella stands, takes a few steps closer to Reed, her heart speeding its fevered pace. “How am I holding up?” she repeats, her voice a near-whisper. She is right in front of Reed now; their noses are practically touching. “I’m here.”

She kisses Reed chastely on the cheek, pulls away, and waits to see how Reed will respond. Her eyes are closed. Her breathing is fast. “Was that okay?” Stella murmurs, watching the other woman’s eyelashes flutter and her chest rise and fall. Reed nods, breathes a hurried “oh, yes,” and that’s all the confirmation Stella needs.

Stella kisses Reed’s temple, her cheekbone, her jaw, her neck that smells of jasmine soap and cinnamon. It is hardly anything yet _sexually_ , but it is so much exactly what Stella had been craving--this undemanding, delicate, tender intimacy--that she half-moans at the sweet relief of it all. Reed’s hands are in her hair--not pulling, just gently exploring, the way two girls might play with each other’s hair at a slumber party. Stella moves her mouth back up to find Reed’s, sliding her tongue inside of it; Reed bites on Stella’s lower lip, and Stella almost grins because Reed Smith is full of surprises today, and _oh_ \--she loves it.

They move together, a fluid tangle of eager limbs, to collapse on Stella’s cot. Their hips are pressed tightly together, their thighs fitted like puzzle pieces; they are flushed and panting, heady with their shared desire. The door to her office is standing mostly open, Stella dimly realizes, but that only makes everything more thrilling. She’s on top but she doesn’t want to be, not now; she wants to let someone else be in charge for once, let someone else be the strong one, take the lead, make the decisions. There’s very few people she’d ever entrust with that role, but she unequivocally trusts Reed Smith with it. Stella changes positions and Reed doesn’t pause, doesn’t blink, slips smoothly into the next wave of touches and kisses without so much as acknowledging the shift. 

They're heating up for nothing short of extraordinary when Reed grips Stella's upper arms--not aggressive, just wanting to feel more of her, just trying to gain purchase--but her hands fall right where there are still painful bruises, and Stella flinches and pulls away. She feels awful as soon as she does it, because Reed looks so anxious and embarrassed, and before the dull echo of an ache has fully faded she’s breathlessly reassuring her: "Reed, it isn't you."

"It's not?"

Stella shakes her head. "I'm just a bit...tender there, is all." She doesn’t offer an explanation, because of course she doesn’t, but Reed still needs one. Because of course she does, because she’s Reed. 

"Are you hurt? What happened?" Her expression works its way from worried to horrified as every terrible possibility surfaces: "Was it Spector? Did he do something to you?"

"No, no," Stella says. "No, he stayed quite hidden the whole time, just as I said before. This is nothing to do with him."

Reed is looking at Stella, and now her eyes full of disquiet and residual wanting. “I promise,” Stella finishes, but Reed appears unconvinced. "Can I see?" she asks tentatively. "Can I at least see where it is you're injured?" 

Stella hesitates, but then she walks over to the door and quietly pushes it closed. She'd laugh at the irony of it--caught mid-sexual encounter in her office, who gives a shit; but seeing her _injured?_ never--if it weren't all so wretched. She slowly pulls off her blouse, revealing tracks of yellowing, finger-shaped bruises on her arms, with larger matching bruises on her back and shoulder blades. Reed gasps. "How… how--Stella, who did this to you?" she asks as the inspects the marks carefully, gently.

Stella waits a beat before she answers, briefly contemplates protecting him, and is immediately shouted down by her better feminist self: "Burns."

Reed exhales a low breath. "That _fucking fuck_ ," she hisses.

Stella laughs humorlessly. "An accurate assessment, Dr. Smith."

"When?" Reed demands, and she isn’t just angry, she’s _livid_. 

"The same night as when Spector broke in. It happened while he was in the closet, according to the CCTV. I suspect he heard most of the...altercation."

"Jesus Christ."

"Yes." Stella is trying to read her, but unaccustomed as she is to seeing Reed this worked up, can’t quite discern her next move.

"What the hell happened?" Reed asks, and she still sounds absolutely furious, though Stella knows that none of it is directed at her.

"He came to my hotel room, drunk," Stella explains dully, as though all she's doing is reciting an especially boring evidence report. "He was going on and on about Aaron Monroe and how he--well, that doesn't really matter now. Anyway, he became very emotional, very… distraught. He said he wanted me, that he needed me, that he loved me, but I said no," Stella's voice catches, but she blinks back, finds herself, keeps going. "I said no. He didn't listen, though. Clearly. He grabbed me, that's what the finger marks are. I kept pushing him off, and he ended up shoving me into a wall." _Throwing you into a wall, really_ , her internal monologue corrects her, but Stella doesn’t want to upset Reed more than she already has.

"Stella," Reed whispers. "Oh, Stella."

Stella's cheeks are damp, and she realizes that she must've been crying. _Strange_ , she thinks. She hasn’t felt especially upset about Burns until now; she wonders if she might’ve still been in shock from it all. She roughly wipes the tears away, draws in a deep breath. "It never escalated beyond a struggle," Stella says. "And just after he pushed me into the wall, I managed to free a hand and hit him in the nose." Through watery eyes, she smiles. "Nearly broke it."

"Good for you," Reed says fiercely, and there will be time to laugh and praise her brave Stella for that later. Now she’s tracing her fingers over Stella’s bruises, as though her light touches might heal them, and it feels so sublime that Stella can’t help but think that it might truly be working. She’s heard of the laying on of hands; divine or not, something in Reed’s touch is impossibly cathartic in that moment, and she closes her eyes, lies down, places her head in Reed’s lap. Then she thinks that she might never budge up the will to move again, she’s so comfortable and warm there.

Into the still silence Reed whispers, “Have you told anyone? Besides me, I mean?”

Stella opens one eye. “Are you asking if I’ve reported it?” she mumbles warily.

Reed hesitates a beat before saying, “Yes.”

Stella rubs a hand over her face. “No,” she says. “I haven’t.” She can feel Reed go slightly rigid, and she blanches.

“Stella,” Reed says, “you need to report it. You do.”

Stella bristles. “I don’t need to do anything,” she says, a bit more waspishly than she’d intended, and when she feels Reed’s hands draw away from her she grabs for them, sits up. “I’m sorry,” she says. “I didn’t mean to snap.” _Please don’t be angry. Please. Please don’t go._

Reed shrugs a single shoulder. “And I didn’t mean to tell you what to do,” she says, a bit coldly, and then frowns. “But, Stella,” she pleads, and now there’s something almost motherly in her voice, “you can’t not report this. If it’d happened to anyone else, you’d be furious if it slipped under the radar, if it weren’t at the very least _addressed._ ”

Stella pinches the bridge of her nose. “I know,” she says. “I know. But if I report it, there’ll be paperwork. There’ll be an inquiry. There’ll be interviews. Burns might be taken off the case and--Jesus, while I _loathe_ saying this, believe me--we need him. It’ll be a distraction. It’ll take away from Annie Brawley,” she offers Reed a meaningful glance, “and from Rose.”

“It won’t--”

“It will,” Stella says firmly. “You don’t know how these things work. I do. If worse came to worst, they could invalidate crucial bits of information that’ve passed through his and my hands; they could say the chain of evidence has been broken, could reassign us all, could give it to someone who doesn’t know all that we know about Spector, who isn’t nearly so close to _stopping_ the bastard. They might never catch him, and he’s _killed_ three women already.” 

“I can’t stand the thought of Burns getting away with this, though,” Reed despairs.

Stella tucks Reed’s hair behind her ear. “Trust me,” she says. “He didn’t.”

Reed raises her left eyebrow again, this time more concerned than amused, and Stella is reminded of their earlier activities with a sudden rush of sensation down towards her lap. “I did get a pretty good punch in, and he seemed more than a little ill the next morning...” Reed still doesn’t look satisfied. "I also kneed him in the pants,” Stella finishes quietly. After a beat she flicks her eyes back up to meet Reed’s, and then all at once they’re laughing, Reed’s arms around Stella loosely enough to not hurt her bruises.

When the giggling has died down, they’re left embracing, neither wanting to let go but unsure how to proceed. After a minute Reed wraps one arm over Stella’s bare shoulder and begins tracing aimless circles and lines over the milky, unharmed skin between her shoulder blades. This goes on for a few more minutes, until Stella lets out a particularly deep breath that sounds almost like a sigh, triggering Reed to say _now or never_ and pull away just long enough to spontaneously whip her shirt off.

"Now we're even," she says simply, and Stella smiles.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Like the previous one-shot, the title for this one comes from the Cummings poem "since feeling is first".
> 
> Reed referring to Burns as a "fucking fuck" was inspired by none other than Queen Gillian Anderson herself, who once during an interview revealed that her favorite swear is "Fuck you you fucking fuck," which we think is just beautiful.
> 
> Also, for the record, in our minds Stella absolutely reported Burns once Spector was apprehended; there wasn't really a way to add that detail to the one-shot organically, but we do think it's very important to note that it happens eventually, at least in our headcanons.


	4. "if i have made / a fragile certain / song under the window of your soul"

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _"Stella has returned to their table and is looking curiously up at Reed standing in the spotlight. Reed’s heart is racing because she’s about to do something terribly impulsive, but she picks up the microphone anyway and smiles at Stella and says, “Stella Gibson--this one’s for you.”_
> 
>  
> 
> In which this one-shot is just a bit of silliness, really: Stella and Reed go to a karaoke bar. And drink. A lot. Adorableness ensues.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> *each chapter of this fic can stand alone as a separate one-shot ficlet, but we'd love you forever if you'd read them all, and plus some of the themes and cute fluffy things and character quirks come up in multiple chapters, and plus why wouldn't you want to read all about Stella and Reed being hella cute?  
>   
>  _chapter info:_  
>  **approximate word count:** 2.4k  
>  **rating:** T  
>  **keywords/tags:** fluffy af ~ drunkenness ~ falling in love ~ cuddling

“I cannot believe you talked me into this.”

“Oh, hush, you. It’ll be fun.”

“In my personal experience, _it’ll be fun_ is something people say only if they’re worried it’s not going to be any fun. At all.”

Reed rolls her eyes and peers at Stella from over the song list. “Order a drink and stop complaining,” she commands.

Stella half-smiles, leans on an elbow, and nudges Reed’s foot with her own beneath the table. “I rather like it when you’re bossy.”

Reed looks up from the song list and winks. “There’s more where that came from,” she says, her voice theatrically alluring and low.

“Oh?” Stella leans forward across the table towards Reed, eyes flashing and lips slightly parted. Reed pulls away and smirks.

“You aren’t going to seduce me out of this. You do get points for trying, though.”

Stella scowls, sits back in her seat again, and gestures for a server. Before he’s introduced himself and rattled off the specials, Stella is interrupting: “An Old Fashioned, please. Not too much ice, and don’t waste room with a cherry. And plenty of bourbon.”

“And I’d like a rum punch, please,” Reed says sweetly. “Lots of rum.”

The server slinks away looking a bit bewildered, and Stella casts Reed a sour look somewhere between irritation and grudging acceptance. “We’re going to need it,” she says darkly.

Reed makes a frustrated sound and suddenly tosses the song list down on the table. “For the love of Christ, Stella,” she says, clearly exasperated. “It’s _karaoke_!”

“Yes, I am well aware,” Stella says, and Reed is certain that she’s the only woman in the entire world who can make frigidly frosty seem quite this sexy. Reed sighs.

Stella is staring at a random point somewhere in the middle distance. She seems a bit annoyed, a bit bored, and a bit… something else. Reed cocks her head to the side, her eyes narrowing. _Nervous_ , a small internal voice insists. _She’s nervous_. Reed blinks. That’s precisely it. Stella is so at ease in her professional life, so at ease in this... _whatever_ it is they have--

(neither of them have dared yet to put a name to it and it’s beginning to drive Reed somewhat mad, but she senses that Stella’s seeming aversion to long-term romance goes well beyond her anthropologically supported _people aren’t meant to mate for life_ creed; the last thing Reed wants to do is scare this gorgeous, rare, wild creature into running, though, so for now Reed keeps her mouth shut on the subject.)

Stella is such an outwardly confident person that Reed forgets sometimes that she can actually be quite shy. Brave as she might appear, Stella Gibson harbors her share of genuine fears. Singing seminal pop hits in front of a crowd of strangers, for example, is evidently outside of her comfort zone. Reed glances cautiously back up at Stella, who is absently playing with one of her earrings with a pensive sort of half-frown on her face. She's alarmingly good at hiding how she's feeling, but Reed and her finely-tuned intuition know her well enough by now that with a little context, she can pretty accurately interpret the subtle code of her body language: _she's afraid_.

Overcome by the implications of her sudden revelation, Reed takes Stella’s restless hands in her own and waits for the other woman to meet her eyes. “I really do appreciate you doing this with me,” she says. “Really.” Stella smiles at her--not much, but enough that Reed feels some of the guilt drain away. “It’s just,” Reed continues, “we don’t get to go out and have fun that often. Do you know what I mean? We carry so much of our work with us, and,” here, she falters slightly, “I don’t know. I just wanted one night where we could be sort of... silly. Free. That’s all.”

Stella’s thumb rubs small circles over the soft skin of Reed’s hand. “I suppose that’s fair,” she concedes, and most of the disapproving chill has left her voice. “Though I don’t know if being _silly_ is really within my range of abilities, unfortunately.”

Reed spies their server coming over, their drinks balanced on his tray, both so full that they’re nearly spilling over. Reed grins. “Oh, I don’t know,” she says to Stella. “You might just surprise yourself.”

 

* * *

It’s just after ten, their table is covered in empty glasses, and Stella is _drunk_. Not tipsy, not giggly, not just a little woozy, but utterly plastered; teetering on that last threshold before being entirely functionally immobile. Her face is flushed and her eyes are bright; her hair is messy, her limbs are loose. Her speech isn’t quite slurred, but there’s something freer, more unguarded, about how she’s talking. She says how she's feeling instead of just what she's observing. She laughs at everything Reed says, even the things Reed doesn't intend to be funny. She smiles instead of smirking, and the sleeves of her favorite white silk blouse are rolled partway up her (unsurprisingly toned) arms in a way she'd ordinarily find abhorrently casual. She makes nearly everything that anyone says into an innuendo and then bursts into giggles at her own wit.

It is quite probably the most magnificent and adorable thing that Reed Smith has ever had the privilege of witnessing.

Reed, too, is decently sloshed, but still just sober enough to notice her friend's ( _colleague's? partner's? girlfriend's? fuck buddy's?_ ) unusual behavior. Not that she plans to say anything; she's the last one who'd ever risk saying something that might bring Stella back to Earth. Especially since right now, if you can believe it, she's watching her Stella take the mic again for her third song of the night. _THIRD_. In the couple of hours they'd been at the karaoke bar, Reed had only done one on her own (it was “Dancing Queen” because as much as Stella teases her about it, she loves ABBA with her whole heart), but Stella's first performance--a campy rendition of "Diamonds are a Girl's Best Friend" two and a half Old Fashioneds ago--was such a hit that she lined up a sizeable queue of potential songs. A bit later she'd taken to the stage again for “I Will Survive”, which she had dragged Reed into dueting on mid-verse, and now the speakers are playing the opening to something Reed doesn't yet recognize. It’s slower, a little melancholy; it’s not so much a power ballad as it is, well, a ballad. She still seems playful, but there’s something new in her expression now; an element of little-girl-lost.

“ _There are worse things I could do_ ,” Stella sings, her voice quieter, less showy than it’s been for the other numbers, “ _than get with a boy, or two_.”

Reed recognizes it now: it’s Rizzo’s big number from _Grease_. She swallows. Her throat swells in a sudden rush of affection-- _love_ , she realizes. Grease has never been one of her favorite musicals nor has she ever had a particular affinity for this song, but those lyrics coming out of Stella’s mouth--honest and aching, and so very Stella--suddenly Reed feels as though she might cry.

“ _I don’t steal, and I don’t lie_ ,” Stella’s voice is on the verge of breaking and a rush of protective instinct courses through Reed, “ _but I can feel, and I can cry. A fact I’ll bet you never knew._ ” She takes a slightly shuddery breath as she gets ready for the last lines. “ _But to cry in front of you… that’s the worst thing I could do._ ” If Reed wasn’t crying before, she is now. She needs to hold Stella. Immediately.

The audience explodes (when is karaoke _ever_ this excellent and heartfelt?) and though Reed knows that there’s a line of people ahead of her, she rushes up to the stage. She doesn’t make it to Stella quite in time to pull her into her arms and is momentarily crestfallen, but then she has an idea. She pushes past groups of people, sidles up to the DJ, and whispers something in her ear. She sighs and grumbles a little, but waves Reed on stage anyway. The audience and waiting line of patrons are only a little bit disgruntled; they’re getting a kick out of the pair of ordinarily buttoned-up professional women, totally drunk and not without talent, belting out song after song.

Stella has returned to their table and is looking curiously up at Reed standing in the spotlight. Reed’s heart is racing because she’s about to do something terribly impulsive, but she picks up the microphone anyway and smiles at Stella and says, “Stella Gibson--this one’s for you.”

Stella blushes, and Reed suspects that, in this case, it’s not entirely alcohol-related. The song kicks on and Reed waits nervously through the jazzy intro, searching desperately for the sort of courage one keeps tucked away in secret places for occasions such as this one. “It had to be you,” she begins, and now Stella is absolutely beaming. “ _It had to be you. I wandered around and finally found the somebody who could make me be true; could make me be blue. Or even be glad, just to be sad, thinking of you._ ”

Reed knows she isn’t the greatest singer but, God, she loves doing it, and in this moment flat notes or stumbled words don’t matter, really. She’s singing a promise, a reassurance, their own private lullaby. The bar might as well be empty. Reed only has eyes for Stella; Stella only has eyes for Reed. It’s like they’re they’re reliving their moony teenage years, and Reed is making up choreography, she’s doing various dramatic faces to match the lyrics, she’s laughing her way through every word--anything to keep Stella smiling the way she is.

“ _For nobody else gave me a thrill,_ ” Reed belts, “ _with all your faults, I love you still! Baby, it had to be you, wonderful you, had to be you_!”

Stella is onstage before the number is over, and the moment Reed’s placed the microphone back in its stand Stella is grabbing her face with both hands and kissing her hard and long and sweet. Something hot and sparkling, like fireworks, goes off in Reed’s chest and this is crazy, this is ridiculous, this is absurd, but don’t stop, never stop, you can kiss me forever if that’s you want. It’s messy in the best way and the lights are hot and the audience is absolutely losing their minds and when Stella finally breaks the kiss Reed has to grab hold of Stella’s shoulder to keep from fainting.

“Take your tops off!” some man towards the back of the bar shouts. “Show us your tits!” Stella thrusts her middle finger in the air as she stumbles down the steps of the stage. In her consternation she nearly trips, and Reed rushes up to steady her with an arm around her waist.

“Come on,” she murmurs into the spiral shell of Stella’s ear. “It’s time to go home.”

 

* * *

It’s just after three in the morning, but neither Stella nor Reed want to give in to the temptation of sleep. That would mean the night’s over, and it’s been an impossibly lovely, perfect night. “Stella,” Reed says, her voice heavy with sleep and alcohol.

“Hmm?”

“I don’t want it to be tomorrow.”

Reed can feel Stella shift next to her and roll over so they’re facing each other. Stella nuzzles her face into Reed’s neck. “No,” she says. “Nor do I.”

Something catches in Reed’s throat (drinking makes her unbearably weepy), and she says, “I don’t know that it’ll ever be so nice again as it was tonight.”

“It will,” Stella says, the words barely audible.

“Do you promise?”

“I promise.”

The logical part of Reed knows that it’s not a promise Stella can keep and is resisting believing her with everything it has, but some other, smaller part--the part that’s fueled purely by emotions, by infatuation with Stella, by hope--insists quite simply that it’s true. For the moment, Reed chooses to trust that voice instead.

“Stella?” Reed whispers again.

“Mmm.”

“Will you sing me something?” Reed feels ridiculous the moment the request passes her lips, and she’s sure that Stella is going to say _no, sorry, not tonight, I’m exhausted_. But because maybe somewhere the stars are perfectly aligned, because maybe there’s a God and She wants to see Stella and Reed together, because maybe at some point in her life Reed did something truly, unfathomably good--Stella doesn’t say no; she sits up, clears her throat, and begins.

“ _There’s a saying old says that love is blind_ ,” Stella sings, wavery and sleepy and beautiful, “ _still we’re often told seek and ye shall find._ ” Stella really has a lovely voice, among other things, and Reed is struck once more by the miraculousness of this creature snuggled up with her in her bed. Stella continues: “ _So I’m going to seek a certain girl I’ve had in mind..._ ”

The weepiness is hitting Reed anew because she truly can’t remember the last time she felt this safe and warm and loved. The tears are quiet and she allows herself to spill them on the soft plushness of her pillow. Seemingly unconsciously, Stella’s gentle fingers are on her face, wiping the tears away as she sings.

“ _There’s a somebody I’m longing to see. I hope that she turns out to be..._ ” Stella is crying now, too, but it’s not a sad sort of crying; it’s an overwhelmed sort. A happy sort. An _I can’t believe that you are here, that I am here, that we are together. That you’ve found me_ sort. Her voice breaks as the tears come more heavily, and she pauses to take a breath. “ _Someone to watch over me,_ ” she finishes, and kisses Reed’s forehead with such tenderness that half-asleep Reed can hardly breathe for all the joy it brings her.

Slipping into the liminal space between sleep and awake, they lie together, embracing, drifting off into warm sweet dreams.

Reed’s not entirely sure if she manages to verbally articulate the words, but she’s sure as anything that she’s said them, that Stella hears them: “Stella. I love you. I do.”

And Reed also can’t be sure about the next part because she’s gone to the world, but she’s almost positive she hears Stella say, “I love you, too.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The title comes from the cummings poem "O Distinct".
> 
> We came up with a lot of songs we could imagine Stella and Reed both singing for karaoke (though obviously we couldn't include all of them), so here are the ones that didn't get mentioned directly: Hollaback Girl (Stella), Take a Chance on Me (Reed), Respect (Stella), Think (Stella), and Come Away with Me (the two of them together).


	5. “we are for each other: then”

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _There’s a pause just long enough that Reed is sure she might have a heart attack, but then Stella closes the gap between them. “If I weren’t worried I would get you sick,” she whispers, her lips centimetres from Reed’s ear, “I would kiss you. Right now.” Her mouth moves down to Reed’s neck. “Right here, in fact.”_
> 
>  
> 
> Stella is ill and Reed takes more care of her and they curl up on the couch together and watch musicals and essentially it's all just too sweet for words.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> *each chapter of this fic can stand alone as a separate one-shot ficlet, but this one is really also meant to be a continuation of the second chapter of this fic, and we'd love you forever if you'd read them all, and plus some of the themes and cute fluffy things and character quirks come up in multiple chapters, and plus why wouldn't you want to read all about Stella and Reed being hella cute?  
>   
>  _chapter info:_  
>  **approximate word count:** 2.7k  
>  **rating:** T  
>  **keywords/tags:** illness/care ~ friends to lovers ~ hurt/comfort ~ fluff ~ cuddling

The next morning, Stella wakes early for work, effectively--purposefully?--flying in the face of Reed’s doctorly recommendations that she commit to resting for a day or two. Reed finds Stella in the kitchen: the coffee pot is brewing and Stella is dressed and ready to slip out as soon as her cup has been poured. “I sincerely doubt Spector has any plans to take a day off from stalking and strangling,” she says tiredly, before Reed has a chance to say _anything_ , “which means I can’t afford to take a day off, either.” Reed, who is normally not easily awakened but had immediately become alert at the loss of Stella’s considerable body heat beneath the covers, blinks, assuming her severe disciplinary expression: the one she uses when any number of gregarious and cocky male doctors undermines or doubts her expertise, or when her daughters are particularly misbehaving. Grabbing one of Reed’s hands in both of her own, Stella says pointedly, “Think of Rose.”

Reed flinches. As always, Stella is right; she’s very, very right. But that doesn’t make Reed feel much better. “At least drink some Lemsip before you go,” she says, and she has to suppress a smile when Stella scrunches up her nose and, before promptly reassuming her icy facade, actually _sticks out her tongue_ just a bit at the suggestion.

“I detest Lemsip,” she says, with a sniffle that could be either of distaste or of illness; Reed can’t be sure.

Reed places her hands on her hips and tilts her head to the side. It makes a funny picture, Stella standing there pouting in her pumps and silk blouse and leather pencil skirt, svelte and professional, and Reed playing the grown-up caregiver in her moon-and-star print flannel pyjamas and ratty camisole. “I’m sorry,” she says, “but how old are you again?”

Stella smiles slightly, not her usual wan smirk-smile, but a genuine one that draws her lips apart to show a sliver of teeth and lights something in her eyes. “Six?” she offers, playing along. “Six and three quarters?”

Reed sighs, laughs, picks the Lemsip satchel up off the counter. “Take it with you,” she instructs, ignoring Stella’s ( _adorable_ ) noises of protest. “Please. Just humour me.”

Stella rolls her eyes, but stows it away in the pocket of her coat all the same. Then she fixes Reed with that unwavering Stella-Gibson-stare. “What?” Reed asks, feeling transparent and strange under her intense gaze. “What is it?”

“Why are you doing all this?” Stella asks, direct as ever. It might be refreshing if it weren’t so completely unnerving. It might not be so completely unnerving if Reed had a more appropriate answer to give her.

Reed thinks a moment, wondering what sort of answer Stella is looking for, and eventually decides to follow Stella’s lead; to be bluntly honest. “I’m doing this,” Reed says, her pulse thrumming, “because I _like you_. Quite a bit, actually.”

There’s a pause just long enough that Reed is sure she might have a heart attack, but then Stella closes the gap between them. “If I weren’t worried I would get you sick,” she whispers, her lips centimetres from Reed’s ear, “I would kiss you. Right now.” Her mouth moves down to Reed’s neck. “Right here, in fact.”

“Oh,” Reed says faintly. That’s all she’s got, because every inch of the fragrant and alluring Stella Gibson is still alarmingly close to every inch of the trembling and furiously blushing her.

Stella smiles, and it’s a pale imitation of her earlier one, but it’s a smile all the same. “Can I see you later tonight?” she asks.

Power of speech having not yet returned to her, Reed can only nod. “Good,” Stella says, mouth slightly open, her expression one of deep satisfaction. She turns to head out, and then, from over her shoulder, nearly purrs, “Thank-you for the Lemsip, darling.”

 _She really can make anything sound unbearably sexy_ , Reed thinks, shaking her head. The front door shuts behind her. Reed remains stock-still in the center of her kitchen.

She might need a cold shower.

 

***

Reed texts Stella periodically throughout the day to see how she’s holding up, and though Stella’s answering texts are always carefully worded so as to reassure her that she’s doing _perfectly fine, thank-you_ , Reed isn’t convinced. Reed is especially worried when, towards the late afternoon, Stella has to go to some crime scene ( _in the rain again; she’ll get so chilled_ , Reed thinks anxiously) that may or may not have involved Paul Spector and that would already be bad enough on its own but with Stella being ill, too--it’s a lot. Too much.

Reed tries not to wait for the familiar ding of her phone and tries to focus instead on her work (she’s spectacularly unsuccessful at both the former and the latter). When the text alert does finally come Reed is grasping for her phone embarrassingly quickly, like a prep school girl nursing a new and sparkling crush.

_Back at the station. Wasn’t Spector. A complete clusterfuck/waste of time & resources. Am drenched. Also v bitter._

Reed’s mouth works its way into an overly-sympathetic pout, the words _poor baby_ running across her mind even though she knows there isn’t a phrase that’s ever described Stella Gibson less accurately.

_How are you feeling?_

Reed is frustrated at herself the moment the message sends, worried that she might come off as too smothering, too motherly, too concerned, too--

_Ding._

Oh.

_Honestly? I’m a bit tired._

Reed frowns. It’s not much of an admission, but it’s still more of one than Stella’s ever been known to give.

_Is there anything I can do?_

_I would not say no to having macaroni and cheese for dinner_ and, a moment later, _it’s my… comfort food, I suppose._

_Consider it done._

 

***

It’s near nine and the macaroni and cheese is warming on the stove when the doorbell rings. “Coming!” Reed shouts. “Hold on!”

Reed opens the front door and Stella Gibson is standing on her porch again, and she looks more rumpled and spent than ever. Reed purses her lips. “Get inside right this second,” she orders, and Stella laughs weakly and complies.

“Aren’t you going to say _I told you so_?”

“My being right won’t make you any less ill,” Reed says simply, and almost grins when Stella blinks, falters, because that means her answer caught Stella off-guard, and that’s something that happens all of… well, never.

Reed makes her way into the kitchen. Stella takes off her absurdly high heels (which Reed happens to know Stella only wears because she loathes being so small, though she’s been sworn to secrecy on that particular tidbit) and hangs up her coat. Reed can just make out what sounds like Stella catching her customary three sneezes into a tissue, then the nose blow that follows. "Bless you!" Reed calls. “The girls are with their father tonight, so it’s just the two of us." _I’m hoping that fact will work in my favor_ , Reed doesn’t say, doesn’t even think, absolutely not. “I haven’t made macaroni and cheese from scratch in _years_ ; I never have the time. But it was actually fun and I _think_ it turned out alright, though the jury is still out...”

Stella appears in the kitchen doorway. “You made it from scratch?” she says, and Reed notes unhappily that her voice is nearly gone.

“Of course I did,” Reed says, her focus on spooning the steaming pasta shells into two bowls. Then suddenly Stella’s arms are around her waist, and she almost flings a ladle-full of macaroni across the room, she’s so surprised.

“You,” Stella says, “are a saint. Truly.”

Even though Reed knows it’s from illness, she still finds the new, rougher quality to Stella’s voice incredibly alluring, and completely without meaning to she’s turning in the other woman’s arms and her lips are on Stella’s lips and her hand is caressing the nape of Stella’s neck. “You’re going to catch this,” Stella says vaguely into Reed’s clavicle, though she makes no moves to leave the embrace, keeping her arms tightly wound around Reed’s waistline.

“I don’t care,” Reed says. Then she kisses Stella harder.

 

***

An hour later--two thirds of it spent kissing, the other third happily devouring the mac and cheese, which is delicious even after being reheated--they are a tangle of pyjama-clad limbs on Reed’s living room sofa. Stella has all but abandoned her silly _I’m fine, don’t worry about me_ charade and is wrapped in an especially cozy quilt, nursing a mug of Lemsip. Studying her, it occurs to Reed that this obviously can’t be the first time Stella’s been ill, and she wonders what Stella did before she had someone to take care of her, how awful and lonely it must’ve been to soldier through it all by herself. Reed stares at the lovely, guarded, impossibly brave being sitting now so very close to her, and her heart pangs.

But _there will be time_ ; there will be time to be sad, to worry over Stella, later. For now, life is simple and sweet. Nearly half the chemist is spread out on the coffee table--thermometer, hot water bottle, tissues, lozenges, various medicines and herbal remedies--and Reed is ridiculously, deliriously happy. And in spite of everything, Stella doesn’t seem to be faring too terribly, either.

“What do you want to do now?” Reed asks.

“That’s something of a loaded question,” Stella says, her tone serious, her eyes playful.

Reed smacks her lightly on the arm. “Oh stop,” she says. “You know what I meant.”

Stella rubs her eyes, sniffles, and coughs (Reed's Mum Ears--which are even keener than her Doctor Ears--detect a faint wheeze to Stella's cough and breathing, and she makes note to check on that later). “I suppose we could watch a movie,” Stella says. “Though I should warn you, there’s an excellent chance I’ll be asleep on your lap fifteen minutes in.”

“I think I can find a way to live with that,” Reed says, as though it’s the biggest inconvenience in the entire world (she’s thrilled at the prospect). “What do you want to watch?” she asks, moving to get up and look through the movie cabinet.

Stella doesn’t answer, and she stays silent for so long that Reed wonders if she’s already drifted off. Then, though: “You can’t laugh at me.”

Reed gives her A Look. “Why on Earth would I laugh at you?” she asks.

“Because,” Stella begins, looking anywhere but at Reed, “my film genre of choice… It is, perhaps, a bit _out of character_ , if you will.”

Reed’s eyebrows go up. “And what is your film genre of choice?” _Provided it’s PG or less and features princesses and/or anthropomorphized animals, we’ve got it._

Stella intently examines her fingernails as she says, “Musicals. Especially older musicals.”

Reed can’t help it, she does start laughing, though it’s not for the reason Stella likely thinks. Stella is blushing and she looks so genuinely horrified and hurt that Reed rushes over to the couch and wraps her in a hug. “I’m not laughing at you,” she says, though Stella appears unconvinced. “Honestly, I’m not. I love musicals; _that’s_ why I’m laughing. I’ve got a case of my own DVDs upstairs; I keep them away from the girls’ movies so they won’t get lost or scratched up. I’ll fetch a few of them now.”

She returns with _The Sound of Music, West Side Story, Meet Me in St. Louis_ , and _Singin’ in the Rain_. Stella, impressed, examines the selection with interest. “Much as I love _Meet Me in St. Louis_ ,” she muses, “it’s sad, I’m exhausted, and that combination will make me dreadfully weepy. That also goes for _West Side Story_.”

“Weepy?” Reed says. “You?”

“I’ve a soft spot for theatre,” Stella says, almost sheepish. Reed wants desperately to kiss her.

“Well, we certainly don’t want you to be weepy,” Reed says. “And between you and me, I think _Sound of Music_ is a bit overrated. Though I do adore young Julie Andrews.”

“Agreed. And agreed emphatically.”

“So, Singin’ in the Rain?”

Stella answers with a weary smile. “I was going to suggest precisely that.”

Reed pops the movie into the player, then rejoins Stella on the couch. The movie-choosing-interlude having disrupted their earlier cuddling, Reed is nervous to start it again, and--oddly enough--Stella appears to be just as apprehensive. They stay in separate spots, feet barely touching, as the overture begins. In her corner, Stella occasionally shifts and fidgets, and the movie’s been on for twenty minutes when she finally says, “I can’t get comfortable.”

Her arms are folded and she’s pouting a little and, really, she’s practically whining and it’s all so _un-Stella_ that Reed kind of adores it, instead of finding it irritating as she would with anyone else. “So lie down,” Reed says, patting her lap, with a smirk that rivals Stella’s.

Stella gratefully slumps down, lays her head on Reed’s thigh, and curls her legs underneath herself with a slight shiver. Reed reaches down to smooth a lock of hair away from Stella’s face, and is startled to realize that her forehead is clammy with sweat. “Oh, Stella,” she says, “you’re quite feverish. I should go get you an ice pack--”

“Don’t you _dare_ move,” Stella bosses as fiercely as she can with her utterly shot voice. “This is the first position that hasn’t left me achy in some capacity.”

“But you’re--”

“ _No_.”

Reed sighs, but reasons that the cold medicine Stella took not too long ago will bring her fever down just as well as an ice pack would. Really, Reed can’t bear to try and move Stella when she’s finally gotten so happy and relaxed. On _her_. It’s a scenario that’s both impossibly delightful and delightfully impossible. The solid warmth of Stella’s head on her leg is wonderful, and Reed finds herself running her fingers through Stella’s slightly damp hair. The sigh of contentment the simple contact elicits from Stella is enough to make Reed feel as though she’s just won a Nobel Prize.

“Feels good… don’t stop… please,” Stella mumbles sleepily. And totally unnecessarily, because Reed has no plans to stop at any point in the near (or distant) future. The movie continues, and Stella’s half-awake and unintentionally hilarious comments--

_(“Oh, Debbie Reynolds is so cute and young here, I’d quite like to kiss her; it’s too bad she has such a terrible mother/daughter relationship with Carrie Fisher, though.” “That’s milk! For the rain! So they could see it on camera. Disgusting.” “Donald O’Connor has a strange face. It’s too flexy.” “But the dancing! Look at it! HOW!?” “What if at work I just started singing EVERYTHING? What would happen, do you think? Oh, Jesus, just picture Burns’s face.”)_

lessen and lessen. Suddenly the credits are rolling. Reed blinks, and she realizes she hasn’t heard a single word or sneeze or sniffle from Stella in over an hour. As promised, she’s dead to the world.

“I suppose you did warn me,” Reed murmurs, half-laughing. Stella’s mouth is slightly parted, warming a small spot on Reed’s pyjama bottoms. As carefully as she can, Reed slides Stella’s head off her leg and helps her to sit up.

“Mmmm… whattimeisit?” Stella says, her words slurred, her eyes at half-mast and hazy.

“Bedtime,” Reed says quietly. “Come on.”

“Gotta go to work… late… Spector… Rose,” Stella says, and her voice is softer than Reed’s ever heard it; it’s maybe two-percent awake, and it is unbelievably endearing.

The two women start up the stairs--Reed’s arm is around Stella, guiding her. “It’s the middle of the night,” Reed reassures her as they make their way into the bedroom. “Don’t fret; you don’t have to work right now.” _And you won’t tomorrow either_ , she mentally adds. _Not if I have any say in things, anyway_.

Reed tucks Stella into her bed, fills a glass with water, and gets some paracetamol and cough syrup from her medicine cabinet. As she sets the things down on the night table, Stella’s hand winds around Reed’s wrist. “Stay,” Stella murmurs, her eyes already closed.

Reed climbs under the covers, kisses Stella on the cheek, closes the space between their bodies. “I’m not going anywhere,” she says, and she doesn’t.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The title comes from "since feeling is first" for like the millionth time (okay, so maybe the third, but that's still a lot).
> 
> Does anyone else feel all fuzzy and happy after they write something especially gooey? Or is that just me and csiwholocked?
> 
> Also: any of y'all getting preemptively excited for s3 of _The Fall_?! We are praying to the Netflix Powers That Be that Reed and Stella are made into an ~actual thing~
> 
> Also also: Emmy nominations get announced on Thursday! Prayer circle that Gillian Anderson is nominated for _The Fall_ and/or _Hannibal_ (which is my other great TV love).


End file.
